This is 'the war-to-end-all-wars'

The immediate shock of Sept. 11 has nearly dissipated. Its
memory grows dimmer; the dangers seem less imminent. But, not so
for the families struck in the prime of their lives on that horrid
day. These survivors cry out at those who would forget the justice
due America: "Yours is wishful thinking, dangerous thinking.
America, stand true, stand t all. Tell your children that our loved
ones' sacrifice gave our nation a second chance. Listen to your
hearts. Learn from America's history."

In righteousness, let us take up the quarrel with a foe who
threatens our very planet and its civilization. Let us carefully
draw our aim, like the American Minutemen of old, arming ourselves
in a national resolve. No matter what our role or station, we must
not weaken, nor allow ourselves to be struck again,
unaware.

Joined together, in mankind's greatest endeavor, we shall never
allow the concept of human nobility, a nobility due all people who
inhabit this earth, to perish . Nor shall we allow the principles
of human rights to be destroyed by the autocracy of ill-informed
masses or by the dictatorship of foul, self-styled martyrs. Never.
Not while there still exists a Land of the Free and a Home of the
Brave.

Strangely, today looks like any other day. Children still go to
school; crossing guards hold up their "Stop" signs. Rush-hour
traffic still clogs our highways . The stock market is still a game
afoot. In tranquil homes, Mom and Dad think, "I don't really see
this war." And so they say to themselves: Maybe all is
well?

Measured against the "war-to-end-all-wars," World War I, or the
war of our "Greatest Generation," World War II, our global war
against terrorism is a dim contender, very confusing and much less
defined.

Perhaps not. Maybe we are using the wrong yardstick. According
to the history books, World Wars I and II were wars; they were
never called "police actions."

In the 1950s, more than a million Americans went off to fight a
United Nations-sanctioned "police action" in South Korea. They saw
hundreds of days of sub-zero temperatures. As many limbs were lost
to the permafrost as were to the AK-47 automatic rifles the
Communist Chinese put in North Koreans' hands.

Our brave young Americans still volunteered. Their enthusiasm
was borne of growing up in a land greater than their own
imaginations. Sadly, the eagerness of teen-age soldiers to serve a
grateful nation was shattered in midstride. As they ca me home for
a brief respite on furlough, they sensed that somehow, the sky was
s till blue, the people still happy, making money, ignoring the
horror and urgency of the war. They despaired as they realized no
one really cared, no one understood the mission. History, if not
doomed to repeat itself, was starting to rhyme.

In 1953 a "final" armistice was signed to end the war in Korea.
The world and our children were "safe" once again. Never again
would North Korea threaten the Pacific Rim, let alone America. Nor
would North Korea be able to develop weapons of mass destruction,
promote terrorism, or join an "Axis of Evil."

Well, those well-intentioned results never quite came to pass.
Less than six years later, U.S. military advisers, sent to the
obscure Republic of Viet Nam, started paying the price of
unfinished business left over from Korea. This time, our brave
troops came home, not only to blue skies and good economies, but to
young draft-evaders who spat on them. They also suffered from the
indifference of grown people, who had prospered from the military
sacrifices of World War II and Korea, but had never quite brought
themselves to support our boys in Southeast Asia. This national
indifference resulted in more than 55,000 names being inscribed on
a wall in Washington, D.C. Go see it sometime.

Somehow, years later, we, as a people, came to our senses. We
elected an American prophet as President. Ronald Reagan looked at a
divided Berlin, a divided Germ any, indeed, a divided world. Our
Commander-in-Chief then declared, "And I tell Mr. Gorbachev, tear
down that wall."

Well, he did. The Russian people respected Americans for their
strength in asking that a barrier of hate in Berlin be destroyed.
Today, in Afghanistan and in the War on Terrorism, the Russians
have stood by us. They have decided that America is dependable in
time of crisis.

It has been five months since the attack on U.S. soil that so
electrified us. We saw our friends and neighbors murdered by
evildoers who believed themselves heroes. A world was shaken by a
few dangerous madmen who would reorder all civilization to conform
to their own warped ideas.

Americans are a kind and tolerant people. We are a people who do
not hold grudges for long. The masterminds of the suicide attacks,
safe and secure in their rat holes, are probably congratulating
themselves on finding their "enemy's" weakness: a short national
memory.

I think the enemies of civilization have miscalculated. They
have awakened the real America, the America worth fighting for. And
fight, it shall. Our special forces, Marines, crack pilots; these
are not soft children. They are tough, hard, dedicated
professionals. They constitute a truly united force, which serves
as a n example to a now truly United States. They will not trifle
with the enemy.

These terrorists have awakened America, a sleeping giant, a
majestic elephant.

An elephant never forgets. So, if that is what we are, an
awakened and angry giant, how do we keep this memory of an assault
on our very nation alive through the calm eye of the storm? How do
we translate our lingering rage into tough, determined day-to-day
American decisions and united action?

Our President has provided a superb plan of action. Thankfully,
that is not all he is doing. He is also challenging us, as a
people. Our Commander-in-Chief know s that our enemy is counting on
the softness America has exhibited in the last decade: America's
seemingly shallow, short memory; a memory that forgot Cobart
Towers, the U.S.S. Cole, even the 1993 first attempt on the World
Trade Center, less than 10 years ago.

Our enemy believes that time is on its side. That, given a long
enough period of tranquillity, the American people will once again
believe themselves invulnerable. They suspect that Americans will
soon marvel that they believed a global war on terrorism necessary.
That U.S. citizens will stare and wonder at the dusty American
flags in their closets. These zealots believe that the U.S. will
resume a leisurely and naive lifestyle; a lifestyle that will allow
our foes time to develop or acquire weapons of mass
destruction.

Our enemies believe that time is on their side; that time is
their greatest ally. Which is precisely why we must not let their
time rule us. While our cowardly enemies chose the date and the
means to attack us, make no doubt about it, it is we who will chose
the hour and the nature of this conflict's resolution.

Today, we are blessed with a national focus and a strong leader,
supported by the people. Do not take these gifts lightly. They
constitute a second chance for America. Paradoxically, these are
extremely fragile gifts, yet absolutely invincible, if we but take
them seriously. If we do not, if we fall back into the "everyday"
routine, well, then, I suspect they don't have a plot in Washington
large enough for a wall holding all the names of Americans who
would succumb to future, highly coordinated attacks.

So, it becomes obvious to all Americans that we must keep our
memory of Sept. 11 ever clear and ever focused. We must, with all
our hearts and all our actions, support the brave young men and
women who will travel the length and width of our planet, armed, to
stamp out the scourge of global terrorism. With these precepts
engraved upon our souls, we shall finally be able to glimpse a
future end to this war.

But, that alone is not enough. In the interim, as we await our
inevitable, final victory, we must assume a wartime discipline. We
must adopt the patience of the determined; we must also adopt the
determination of vigilance; the virtue of the wary. Our government
in Washington has provided us help in the form of timely alerts
against terrorism. We must become individually responsible for our
own safety.

Let us remember the words of Irving Berlin during the
war-to-end-all-wars, "And we won't be back, 'til it's over, over
there." This is the war-to-end-all-wars.

(The columnist, Bruce Bergmann, is commander of American Legion
Post 43 of Florham Park and Madison.)

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In recent weeks, Long Hill Township and Watchung Borough passed ordinances allowing their police departments to be able to apply for surplus equipment from the Department of Defense. Long Hill recently procured a Humvee to use in times of flooding, which Watchung states as the reason they are getting into the program. However, in cities around the country, police forces have used the program to obtain military gear, such as weapons and armor.
For more background, go to the link below
http://www.newjerseyhills.com/echoes-sentinel/news/watchung-police-department-hopes-to-receive-equipment-from-department-of/article_12ad002a-92b3-5449-a2cc-4b2cf0ce4339.html